Chriesman Settlement

Gay Hill is on Farm Road 390 twelve miles northwest of Brenham in the rolling hills of northern Washington County. The town was an educational and religious center on the La Bahía Road in early Texas. Rev. Hugh Wilson established the second Presbyterian church in Texas there in 1839. Presbyterians from throughout the republic met in the community, then known as Chriesman Settlement, to organize the Brazos Presbytery in 1840. By 1840 the Republic of Texas established a post office in the new town under the name Gay Hill, after the owners of the town store, Thomas Gay and William Carroll Jackson Hill. The beautiful forested hills and healthy climate attracted prominent early Texans, including residents Horatio Chriesman, R. E. B. Baylor, John Sayles, and Dr. George C. Red. Horticulturist Thomas Affleck's Glenblythe Plantation was located in the Gay Hill vicinity. Old Gay Hill served as the supply point of a moderately prosperous agricultural area. In 1854 a Masonic lodge was founded there. Between 1853 and 1888 Rev. James W. Miller operated Live Oak Female Seminary in Gay Hill. By 1860 the town had flour and lumber mills and a population of 280. After the Civil War a cotton gin augmented the town's prosperity; retail establishments continued to thrive. The Masonic lodge and Presbyterian and Baptist churches were active. During the 1870s the town had a Grange and a Democratic Club. The Republican party remained strong among Gay Hill's black residents, despite Greenback party efforts. When the Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe Railway extended to the Gay Hill vicinity in 1881, residents moved the town to its present location, two miles west of the original site. The former location is sometimes called Old Gay Hill.

Adapted from the official Handbook of Texas, a state encyclopedia developed by the Texas State Historical Association (TSHA). It is an authoritative source of trusted historical records.